The ninth Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser, the Ingalls-built USS Leyte Gulf (CG 55), was disestablished as a command on 21 September 2024, 37 years and 1 day since “America’s Battle Cruiser” was commissioned.
USS Leyte Gulf (CG 55), 27 September 2024
In those nearly four decades, she accomplished 17 deployments around the world, ranging from fighting and capturing pirates off Somalia, sending TLAMs to Qaddafi, and, just earlier this year while on Fourth Fleet orders for JIATFS, capturing a narco sub.
The self-propelled semi-submersible vessel intercepted by Leyte Gulf, April 2024 (Photo provided by the US Embassy in Georgetown)
She will be towed next month to the Navy’s Inactive Ships facility in Philadelphia, where the old girl will be retained as a Logistical Support Asset status for a few years.
Just nine Ticos are left on active service, less than one per CVBG.
The last American cruisers are set to withdraw from service in FY27.